Black Seconds (26 page)

Elsa had to think about that. She could not appear too certain. Sejer could tell that she was 269

searching desperately for plausible lies. On top of that she was quite rightly anxious about the evidence they had already collected and of which she knew nothing. It was likely that they had searched Emil’s house as well as her flat.

‘Of course, I can’t swear on it,’ she said eventu ally, having thought about it for a long time. ‘I’m not there every hour of the day. But to be honest, I find it hard to believe that a little girl would go home with Emil of her own accord. No one would dare.’

‘Please would you clarify?’ he asked cautiously.

‘He doesn’t talk,’ she said. ‘And he’s very slow. And he looks gruff. Even though he isn’t. That’s just how his face is.’

Sejer nodded. ‘But we can’t disregard the fact that your son might have had Ida in the house?’

‘There are so many strange things going on in my life right now that I’m not disregarding anything,’

she said brusquely.

She was close to boiling point. She calmed herself. Sejer looked at her earnestly. For a second he had caught a glimpse of the forces that raged inside her: despair and fear.

‘Sometimes people like Emil find it easier to form bonds with children,’ he said gently. ‘They feel less threatened by them. It wouldn’t be the first time.’

She did not comment on this. She chose silence. It struck her that silence was effective. And that Emil had realised this long ago.

‘Your son keeps a bird?’ he said, changing the subject.

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‘Yes. A parrot.’

‘Do you think he benefits from that?’

She felt that this was a safe topic and gave herself permission to reply. ‘I hope so,’ she said. ‘It chirps and sings and is a sort of com panion to him. It doesn’t need more care than Emil can manage.’

‘When I questioned you about it earlier, you denied knowing anyone who owned a bird. Do you recall that?’

‘Yes,’ she said, biting her lip.

‘Why did you deny it?’

‘Don’t know,’ she said defiantly.

‘Well,’ Sejer smiled, ‘it certainly isn’t friendly. One of my officers is walking around with a fairsized hole in his finger.’

She was listening, but his remark failed to produce a smile in her. ‘It’ll never be tame,’ she said by way of explanation.

‘Why not?’

‘Don’t know. I know nothing about birds. It was ten years old when I bought it. It’s nearly sixteen now.’

She looked like she wanted to run away. Her whole body was trembling. She did not want to answer his questions, but she liked him. This confused her. She did not often speak to men. Only with Margot from next door and the women in the sewing circle. Everywhere she went, nothing but women. Now she listened to his deep voice, a professional and very correct voice, agreeable to listen to.

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‘It’s very quiet in his house,’ she said. ‘After all, he never has any visitors. In the shop they told me that the bird could talk. I thought it would do him good to hear a few words every now and again. I had hoped it might trigger something in him.’

‘What does the bird say?’ Sejer asked with interest.

‘Well . . .’ She shrugged. ‘Hi. Hello. Good morning. Things like that. It mainly sings tunes. It picks them up from the radio and the television. Jingles and so on.’ She stared at the table. Out of the corner of her eye she spotted the bottle of mineral water. The glass was cloudy with condensation. ‘I don’t know how long you’re thinking of keeping us here,’ she said, ‘but the bird is going to need feeding and watering.’

Sejer nodded to indicate he had taken this on board. ‘We’ll take care of the bird, should it prove necessary,’ he said.

He knew he would make Elsa Mork talk

eventually. He knew that he was stronger than her. He felt sad when he thought of this. Because right now she felt she was the strong one. She had made the decision not to talk. But she did not know what he knew. Therefore she could not fabricate a story, because she could not see which cards he held. He held many. Ida’s purse, for example, which they had found inside a box of crispbread in Emil’s kitchen cupboard. Perhaps Emil had liked the purse and Elsa had missed it when she cleaned the house. So he had thought of a hiding place for it. There was also the old chest freezer in the basement. Several dark 272

hairs found on the bottom of it had been sent off to forensics. Elsa had not remembered everything; hardly anyone does. Now she was waiting calmly in her chair, determined to win one trick at a time, endure the pain it caused her and think up new answers. After a while, hours or days perhaps, she would start to tire. She was a bright woman. When she realised she was beaten, she would surrender. He allowed the silence to continue for a time and looked at her sideways. Her shoulders were tense, expectant. She can handle a great deal, he thought. A very tough old woman. A real fighter.

‘You’ll get a female defence counsel,’ he said. ‘She has a child too.’

‘Really?’ Elsa said.

‘I just wanted you to know that,’ he added. Elsa disappeared back into her silence. I should have done this more often, she thought. I’ve been talking my whole life. God only knows what I’ve been saying.

‘Please tell me if there’s anything you need.’ Sejer said it with such kindness that she felt it like a caress. She looked at him blankly. Her face opened up for a moment, then it closed suspiciously.

‘I don’t need anything,’ she said. ‘I can manage on my own. I always have done.’

Sejer knew it. He could attack now, suddenly and unexpectedly, just to watch her stumble for a moment. He did not do so. It had to be possible to defeat her in such a way that she kept her dignity. He shrank from pressurising her, shrank from 273

luring her into a wilderness. He would take no pleasure from seeing her shame when he caught her contradicting herself. Most of all he wanted to reach the point where she would tell him everything. Where she would finally unburden herself and confess.

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The press had been hovering, cruising listlessly while there was little progress in the Ida Joner case. Now the journalists nose-dived from a great height towards their rather exotic prey. A seventythree-year-old woman and her fifty-two-year-old son with learning difficulties. This led to much speculation. What exactly had happened to little Ida Joner, what exactly had they done to her?

Even though there was nothing to suggest that Ida had been sexually assaulted, and this was made clear in all the papers, it did not stop the journalists. Surely he must have done something with her? They knew the art of implying. They wrote nothing explicit, but encouraged their readers to use their own imagination, which in turn they duly did. At this point in time it was extremely unclear what precisely had happened to Ida. As a result the journalists had to focus on other things. This was a juicy story. The rumours about the bird with the portentous name, Henry the Eighth, made an impression. Not only did Ida’s suspected killer own a bird that could talk; it 275

also bore the name of a murderer. This story had legs.

Elsa Mork was strong. Like her son, she answered

‘no’ to everything: I’ve never seen Ida Joner. No, I never bought a nightie. You’d go far for your child, but not that far. If I know how to mend clothes?

Repairs and sewing? Of course I do. All women of my age know how to do that.

She was confident and firm. They took her back to her cell.

Sejer went into his office to go through the interrogation in his head. He tried to imagine how Elsa Mork would handle prison, if she were convicted. She would be busy washing the walk ways, he thought; she would rush around wiping the ashtrays in the smoking lounge. He was interrupted by the sound of agitated knocking on his door. Jacob Skarre popped his head round.

‘Just a quick message,’ he said, ready to burst with excitement. Sejer tried to turn his thoughts away from Elsa and everything to do with her.

‘Aha?’ he said, looking up at him.

‘Willy Oterhals has been reported missing.’

Sejer did not understand why Skarre was so excited by this. At the station that kind of report was known as an overprotective parent’s report, given that Oterhals was twenty-two and would most likely turn up of his own accord. Sejer did not reply straight away. He recalled Oterhals from their conversation in the garage. He remembered that he 276

had a record and that he was friends with Tomme. Tomme Rix who was Ida Joner’s cousin.

‘Missing? Missing how?’ he asked, confused.

‘His mother, Anne Oterhals, has just called the duty officer. Willy travelled on the ferry to Denmark together with Tomme on Friday, the twentieth of September. More precisely, they were travelling on the MS
Pearl of Scandinavia
. Tomme returned home Sunday after noon as he was supposed to. But Willy never showed up.’ Skarre let himself fall into a chair. ‘She called the Rixes to ask if they knew where he was. Tomme said they had gone their separate ways at Egertorg. That Willy had disap peared into the underground, going to see a mate apparently. Perhaps there was a reason for the trip to Copenhagen,’ Skarre said. ‘If he’s still selling drugs it might be the case that he buys them in Denmark. He might have gone to deliver them to someone in Oslo. However, that shouldn’t have taken him very long.’

‘I wonder what this means?’ Sejer said. ‘How anxious is his mother?’

‘She says that occasionally he’s gone for a night or two, but that he usually calls her. And he’s not answering his mobile. Normally he always does. It’s like he’s vanished into thin air.’

‘Or the sea, perhaps?’ Sejer said on impulse. ‘No, I was thinking about the ferry,’ he admitted. ‘People have been known to fall overboard. We need to have another word with Tomme. How very

strange,’ he added, resting his elbows on his desk. 277

‘Strange how?’ Skarre said.

‘Well, these two lads,’ Sejer said, ‘who clearly stick together even though Ruth and Sverre Rix are trying their hardest to stop them: perhaps they’re up to something and maybe we ought to look into it?’

He checked the date on his watch. When he was not busy inter rogating Elsa Mork, he would focus on these two. It was as if the boys beckoned him. However, if they were selling drugs, it was not his area, especially not now. It was more important to find out what had happened between Emil and Ida. So why did he have this strange feeling that something did not add up? Why did the boys keep on intruding on his thoughts like some constant distraction? Gripped by a sudden impulse, he called the ferry company’s office in Oslo. He was on the telephone for a long time. After having clarified a few details about that particular crossing, he hung up and got in his car. He did not announce his arrival. He drove straight to Tomme’s house. The Rix family had just finished eating their dinner. Ruth scraped the leftover roast chicken into the bin under the sink. Skin and bones slid down the plates and mixed with other smells. It reeked under the sink; they had had fish the night before. It stinks of decay, Ruth thought. Tomme was in his room. He was halfway through watching
The Matrix
, but he was not really paying attention to the plot. Marion was on her bed, reading.

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Ruth heard a car pull into the drive. She resisted the temptation to look out of the window. They were not expecting anyone. It could be someone selling something. Or local kids out selling lottery tickets for the handball team or the school orchestra. It might even be one of Tomme’s friends, Bjørn or Helge. Then she heard the doorbell. When she saw Sejer standing outside, she looked at him in wonder for a long time. Suddenly she decided she simply was not going to let him in. She thought of Tomme and everything that had happened. She had had enough of it all now and wanted things to be normal again. Two people had been arrested and Ruth had read in the papers that the evidence against them was considerable. Ida’s funeral had taken place. Helga dragged herself slowly through the days, held together by sedatives. Things were just starting to look up. Perhaps this was merely a courtesy call. Sejer waited patiently all the time it took her to think this.

‘I’ve come to talk to Tomme,’ he said. ‘It’s concerning Willy Oterhals.’

Ruth felt like saying that Tomme was not at home, but remembered that the black Opel was parked in the garage. And as far as Willy was concerned, she felt that he ought to mind his own business and not drag other people down with him. She remained silent and clutched the door frame with one hand.

‘He’s still missing,’ Sejer said, suspecting that she might not be entirely aware of the situation. 279

‘Still?’ Ruth said, frightened.

She continued to block the doorway with her body. ‘But Tomme’s told me everything he knows,’

she said in a pathetic attempt at stalling him in the doorway. It was no use.

‘I’d like to hear it from Tomme himself,’ Sejer said firmly. ‘Is he in? Please would you go get him?’

This request was made with such authority that it was impossible for Ruth to object. She stepped away from the door and let him into the hall. Then she went upstairs to get her son. Sejer waited in the living room and noticed that it took quite a while before they both appeared. Tomme looked haunted. Ruth stood next to him, shielding him the way you shield your children from an enemy.

‘You already know what it’s about,’ Sejer began.

‘Let me start with the following question. Did you go to Copenhagen to buy drugs?’

‘Willy,’ Tomme said. ‘Willy went there to do some sort of deal.’ He spoke to the floor, to his socks. ‘I just went along to keep him company.’

‘Did you see the drugs?’

‘No,’ Tomme claimed. He was unable to look Sejer in the eye. Instead he muttered to the floor once more: ‘You’ve probably spoken to his mum, so I guess you already know what happened.’

‘I know nothing at all,’ Sejer said. ‘I’ve only heard some allegations.’

Tomme felt a sting inside his head and the ticking began again at a brisk, constant pace. It was not unbearable, not even painful. But when he thought 280

that it might go on like this for ever, he felt sick. If he told them everything, the ticking would grow louder and culminate in an inferno of noise. But it was the only way he would regain silence. That was how he thought about what was going on inside him.